Betrayal of a brave nurse

EVERY woman dreads having a smear test — and many will seek any excuse to avoid it. That’s why the story of NHS nurse Julie O’Connor, who died of cervical cancer after it was repeatedly missed at Southmead Hospital in Bristol, is so worrying.

Her illness was spotted only when she eventually paid for a private test — by which time it was too late. She died earlier this year, aged just 49.

The long-overdue report into Mrs O’Connor’s case has now been published (seven months late) — but it covers only the period after March 2017, when the catalogue of mistakes was first identified, and not her initial misread smear test back in 2014, nor subsequent missed chances.

It is vitally important that North Bristol NHS Trust gets to the bottom of this. Not just for the sake of Mrs O’Connor and her family, but for the sake of all women who will look at what happened to her and think: ‘If a nurse can be so poorly treated by the health service, why bother at all?’